The invention relates to the art of training athletes. One of the major goals in training and evaluating athletes in all sports, especially football players, is to develop speed, coordination, lateral movement, peripheral vision, and the ability to quickly change direction, also known as cutting.
Although a number of prior devices have been developed for teaching and evaluating athletes on indoor and outdoor playing surfaces of grass and artificial turf, such devices have utilized cones, boards, or other means of positioning of objects and or player athletes (See U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,645,458; 4,047,308; and 2,458,984.)
These traditional approaches used in the prior art for training individuals in the proper techniques for playing football and other sports have several deficiencies, namely, lack of accuracy, extensive set up time, and excessive storage space requirements.
One advantage of the present invention, which is made of flexible elongated materials, is that when it is used as a directional strip or positioning aid, the device can be laid out for specific routes, pass drops, drills, and/or outlining playing fields. Sections of strips may be snapped together by Velcro or grommets to indicate unlimited routes, pass drops, drills, and various playing field designs. The present invention, unlike any prior art, teaches a player in a simple and accurate manner the exact direction he or she should move on any given play or exercise.
Another advantage of the present invention is that it allows set-up of training, timing and practice areas in less time than is required with prior art devices, and it can also be used to mark such areas with precise measurements time after time without error or deviation.
A further advantage of the present invention is that it is light in weight and can be snapped apart very quickly for convenient storage. Currently, heavy awkward orange cones are used to mark training, timing and practice areas.